Summary: Excuses, excuses, you hear them everyday. Now, the devil he’ll supply them, if from church you stay away. When people come to know the Lord, the devil always loses, So to keep them folks away from church, he offers them excuses!

In Jesus’ day when you invited guests to a dinner, you told them the day but not the exact hour of the meal. A host had to know how many guests were coming so he could butcher the right amount of animals and prepare sufficient food. Just before the feast was to begin, the host sent his servants to each of the guests to tell them the banquet was ready and they should come (see Est 5:8; 6:14). In other words, each of the guests in this parable had already agreed to attend the banquet The host expected them to be there.

But instead of eagerly coming to the feast, all of the guests insulted the host by refusing to attend, and they all gave very feeble excuses to defend their change in plans.

The first guest begged off because he had to "go and see" a piece of real estate he had purchased. In the East, the purchasing of property is often a long and complicated process, and the man would have had many opportunities to examine the land he was buying. Anybody who purchases land that he has never examined is certainly taking a chance. Since most banquets were held in the evening, the man had little daylight left even for a cursory investigation

The second man had also made a purchase - ten oxen that he was anxious to prove. Again, who would purchase that many animals without first testing them? Not many customers in our modern world would buy a used car that they had not taken out for a "test drive." Furthermore, how could this man really put these oxen to the test when it was so late in the day? His statement "I go to prove them!" suggests that he was already on his way to the farm when the servant came with the final call to the dinner.

The third guest really had no excuse at all. Since they involved so much elaborate preparation, Jewish weddings were never surprises, so this man knew well in advance that he was taking a wife. That being the case, he should not have agreed to attend the feast in the first place. Since only Jewish men were invited to banquets, the host did not expect the wife to come anyway Having a new wife could have kept the man from the battlefield (Deut 24:5) but not from the festive board.

Excuses, excuses, you hear them everyday. Now, the devil he’ll supply them, if from church you stay away. When people come to know the Lord, the devil always loses, So to keep them folks away from church, he offers them excuses!

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